adminSàO PAULO. — There is silence from current Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro, who lost Sunday’s runoff election, denying him a second term. More than 36 hours after Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva’s victory, Bolsonaro still has not conceded.
The outspoken right-wing populist Bolsonaro has remained uncharacteristically quiet. He hasn’t even issued a public statement.
His communications minister said Bolsonaro plans to meet with the country’s Supreme Court justices but will not contest the election results, Reuters reported late Tuesday morning.
Da Silva, a leftist former two-term president, won the election with 50.9% of the vote, compared to Bolsonaro’s 49.1% — the slimmest margin in Brazil at least since its return to democracy in the 1980s.
Bolsonaro’s continued silence has fueled concerns that he may refuse to recognize the results, as he has previously warned. But some of the incumbent’s allies have acknowledged the election defeat, and the fact that da Silva’s victory has also been acknowledged abroad would make it much harder for Bolsonaro to contest the results.
Bolsonaro allies say he will concede, but will not congratulate da Silva.
Speaking to supporters in São Paulo on election night, President-elect da Silva said, “Anywhere else in the world, the president who lost would have called me by now and conceded.” – npr.org
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